


not as strong as you think you are

by kivancalcite



Category: The Thing (1982)
Genre: Alcohol, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Broken Bones, Canon-Typical Violence, Death, Gen, Graphic Description, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Injury, It's not fun, No Dialogue, Non-Consensual, Slime, Slurs, Squick, Strangulation, Tentacles, also the description of his assimilation sounds kinda...rapey, broken glass, but you may be able to tell what may happen, for use of 'bitch' considering his attitude towards the chess wizard, the tentacles enter through his skin, when i say death i mean technically, yeah he really gets one hell of an assimilation scene here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-22
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-14 08:16:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28917441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kivancalcite/pseuds/kivancalcite
Summary: A short one-shot of Mac retreating into his shack as usual, followed by someone...or something...that clearly has ideas of their own that revolve around one thing and one thing only. And as tough as Mac thinks he is, he's really not prepared for what he's about to go up against.





	not as strong as you think you are

It probably was a stupid idea, but Mac never seemed to lock his shack door and he was tired; not like anyone would dare bother the man considering what he was like. He was also kinda drunk, which didn’t help and was also engaged far too much with his back to the door with the chesswizard, even though he was always far too angry to deal with a machine he pretty much always referred to as a ‘bitch’.

Even though him of all people you would expect to be a little more alert to his surroundings despite his drinking habit, especially with such a recent finding they’d been dealing with. Some incomprehensible…thing. He was already tired of dealing with shit and this was the last thing he needed, heading upstairs to get drunk and get unsurprisingly pissed off at a game machine.

He didn’t hear the door open just slightly enough for…something to get through and through the cloud of alcohol in his brain he could vaguely perceive a sickening wet snap and crunch behind him and he stopped, hearing the breathing of…something that didn’t sound human. His heart raced and he stood up, spinning around as his chair hit the floor and…

…the most horrifying now vaguely humanoid _thing_ was standing in front of him, head split open with blood oozing from its skull and from its eyes, long wet red tendils replacing its arms which were now on the floor. Mac backed off, horrified but pissed off, swearing loudly. The thing was blocking the door and he fucking left his shotgun in the other parts of the outpost and would’ve found something to defend himself with but it had other ideas, letting out a horrifying inhuman screech as it lashed out with what felt like a million red tendrils around his neck.

For a few seconds he couldn’t breathe, hands slipping against the disgusting red tendrils and he grimaced, only to witness the bloody crack of its skull as it opened further like the voracious maw of a wild animal, sick and dripping and his eyes widened at such a new and shocking circumstance before he managed to smash his nearby whiskey bottle on the table and sliced brutally and desperately through the tendrils before it could do what it wanted. It let go momentarily, shrieking in pain before using the tendrils it had to throw him against the floor and he grunted in pain as he hit it with a heavy thud.

He was dazed and forced himself to get up, but the thing had advanced on him and he felt a boot on his chest crushing his ribcage and the shout he would’ve made descended into a cry as the force ended up snapping a rib and the thing looked over him, or he thought it did; its head was split open, dripping blood and gore onto him. He saw the chest swiftly break open as thick tendrils spilled out, angrily twisting around his neck and he had no time to react as his eyes bulged from their sockets. No amount of thrashing helped, arms also now pinned to his sides as they wrapped, soft and sickeningly wet around his body.

They wrapped tight around his legs and they was an agonising crunch as they squeezed hard enough for them to break and he would’ve screamed if he could get out the words, but he was pressed down to the floor, tendrils practically cocooning his whole body. Though he couldn’t really move anyway; he was still conscious but internally panicked as the slow inability to move crept up from his legs, paralysing him but he could still see, see the bloody alien thing just about standing above him as no amount of struggle could get him to fight off it now.

What happened next made his stomach turn and agony became immeasurable, small tendrils now protuding and forcefully splintering his skin in his fingers, hands and legs, fighting their way into his bloodstream and he could feel it burning more than the worst fire imaginable, almost as if he was being eaten alive, creeping through his cells and then—

—up to his brain and though he was paralysed he could want to scream, somehow still remaining alive as it broke into up there and turning his head almost into a blender and he couldn’t do anything but be witness to this excruicating agony as his entire body was being converted into something else and he was helpless to this new process.

Mac was unaware of anything that happened after that, especially since his body was now not his own and thinking and moving and breathing of its own accord. He woke up, blearily, nauseous, sitting up and stretching his body and aching, blood across the floor, smashed whiskey bottle, overturned chair and…not much else. Was he dreaming? He could’ve sworn someone, or _something_ , for that matter was here. But strangely, he shrugged, clearing up the shards of glass and lifting the chair back up, putting on and zipping up his jacket as he made his way outside into the cold Antarctic air.

As he walked into the other parts of the outpost, his body still hurt, wincing at how his chest and legs ached as he walked. There was a slight limp, which he found bizarre and a remarkable headache, and he felt himself nonetheless bypass everything else to get to the medical room, where Copper was busy cleaning a few things up.


End file.
